Mario Del Pero

Containing containment: rethinking Italy's experience during the Cold War

This article examines the impact of the Cold War on the Italian political system. It compares the relations of the two main Italian parties - the DC and the PCI - with their external interlocutors and allies - the USA and the USSR - during the first decade of the Cold War. By doing so, the article rejects traditional interpretations of how post-Second World War international constraints limited Italys sovereignty. It argues instead that the main Italian pro-western party, the Christian Democrats, deliberately opted for a policy of containment of American pressures. Such a policy was functional to the twin objectives of consolidating DC hegemony, and safeguarding Italys new republican constitution.

‘Which Chile, Allende?’ Henry Kissinger and the Portuguese revolution

This article discusses the US reaction to the Portuguese revolution and its impact on the relationship between Washington and its main Western European allies. It analyses the international repercussions of the chaotic Portuguese transition and their impact on Soviet–American détente. Finally, it highlights the different responses to the Portuguese crisis given by the United States, and by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger overall, and by Western European Socialist governments.This article discusses the US reaction to the Portuguese revolution and its impact on the relationship between Washington and its main Western European allies. It analyses the international repercussions of the chaotic Portuguese transition and their impact on Soviet–American detente. Finally, it highlights the different responses to the Portuguese crisis given by the United States, and by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger overall, and by Western European Socialist governments.

Nixon, Kissinger, and U.S. foreign policy making: the machinery of crisis

institutions. The coup was perceived as a corollary of instability, and the military regime, the State Department rationalised, might offer a possibility of political modernisation. With hindsight Keeley’s argument was vindicated by developments. Andreas Papandreou did not actually sever Greece’s ties with NATO. Keeley himself was able to serve US interests in Greece well as an ambassador from 1985–1989, in his second tour in the country – being on good terms with Papandreou and not unduly apprehensive over his rhetoric. Washington, having dealt with the transition from authoritarianism to democracy in southern Europe, had understood that the centre-left was not necessarily incompatible with US interests.

A New Foreign Policy for the United States

Toward the end of 2007 an article published in the Washington Quarterly declared that the 2008 U.S. presidential election felt “more like a Cold War—era election” than a post—1989 one: “perhaps more than any presi- dential contest since 1980 or even as far back as 1968, 2008 will be,” the article stated, “a national security election.”1 This assessment was shared by the majority of commentators and experts. With the country involved in two wars and an endless campaign against terrorism, in an unstable and volatile global climate, it seemed obvious that the electoral debate would evolve around themes related to foreign and security pol- icy. However, that did not prove to be the case. The election pivoted on global themes but not on security per se.